LETTERS: Malaysian sports have not grown due in part to athletes wanting more social security throughout their career.
How many times have we read about the struggles of former professional athletes trying to make ends meet?
From a former national squash champion working as a cleaner to a footballer selling his medals, life after retirement is not smooth sailing for national athletes.
The need for social security goes beyond increased pay and pension schemes.
Two issues require attention. First, inadequate social protection.
Despite being entitled to Employees Provident Fund (EPF) and Social Security Organisation (Socso) contributions from the National Sports Council (NSC), the short career of an athlete renders this effort inadequate.
The retirement age of athletes is from 28 to 32, while the retirement age to withdraw EPF savings is 55.
Assistance schemes are limited. For instance, a one-off RM1,500 aid to registered athletes wishing to pursue a degree is insufficient to meet high tuition fees.
Second, inadequate support for sports-to-work and sports-to-education transition.
The NSC's Malaysian Athlete Career and Education (Mace) programme, which assists athletes in education, career and welfare, lacks publicly available information about its programmes.
A former national athlete said Mace didn't have a formalised and structured system to retain retired athletes as part of the sports ecosystem.
Existing Scholarship schemes for athletes are not adequate to meet athletes' post-retirement needs.
Most are only for athletes who are on the national programme, meaning they must either struggle to balance sports and education, or lose the chance at funding their education if they focus only on sports.
In this regard, Malaysia does not need a new system, but rather a revamp of existing ones.
We have agencies and programmes that cater for the welfare of professional athletes.
So the Youth and Sports Ministry should focus on empowering them to be fit for purpose.
Start with streamlining processes and empowering programmes to benefit retired athletes.
Expand the National Athletes Welfare Foundation membership to state athletes. Provide more long-term support compared with initiatives.
Mace could set a standard athlete-to-sports pathway for athletes interested in pursuing coaching, research or management in the sports industry.
Or it could collaborate with companies and organisations to set up programmes for job matching and opportunities for athletes.
Mace could provide scholarship-matching services and facilitate the application for financial aid for B40 and M40 athletes, and encourage scholarship schemes to set criteria to include retired and older athletes.
Singapore's Sport Excellence framework, which focuses on supporting athletes in different facets of their lives, has been up and running since 2013.
Since its implementation, there has been a steady increase in Singapore's index in the World Sports Ranking.
With a better social security plan, more athletes would consider the athletic profession as a full-time career.
They would then be able to give their all to the sports, and hopefully, this would set more national athletes on the track for gold.
KUHANEETHA BAI KALAICELVAN
BOR NENG QUAN
SHAHEEROL IZUAN NOR MAZLAN
SIA WAN HUI
Undergraduate students
The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the New Straits Times